Hellraisers Journal: From The Comrade: “How I Became a Socialist” by Father Thomas Hagerty, Seventh in Series

4th October 20229th November 2022 Janet RayeHellraisers Journal

Quote EVD, Father Hagerty, SDH p1, Aug 15, 1903 —————

Hellraisers Journal – Saturday October 4, 1902
“How I Became a Socialist” by Father Thomas Joseph Hagerty

From The Comrade of October 1902:

How I Became a Socialist.

VII. [of Series]

By Rev. T. [J]. HAGERTY.

A CONVICTION grew upon me in my boyhood days-which has broadened and deepened with the out-going years—that human nature is inherently good. In the old Hebraic records, composite of earlier documents which register the world’s notion of creation, I was caught by the reiteration of the idea of the goodness of all things. The after-development of tribe and nation, however, seems to give the lie to this primal verity. Prophets and philosophers in the cuneiform script and Vedic hymn of Egypt and India, singers and sculptors in the psalm and glistening marble of Palestine and Greece, throughout the centuries have sought to keep alive the sense of goodness in the brain of man. Yet all the time murder and rapine, disease and wretchedness flaunted denial in the face of truth. Pariah, slave, and bond-servant groaned in hopeless toil the while Kung-fu-sdu and Gotamma the Buddha proclaimed kindness and justice and David and Homer sang of high emprise.

Christianity came, with a catholic breadth of goodness, teaching the brotherhood of man, gathering up the treasures of foregoing ages wherewith to enrich the race, and sending messengers of peace through all the turbulent highways in every land. Far-reaching deeds of love marked its growth in palace and hovel: yet the clash of swords and the snarl of the slave-driver’s lash broke in upon its holiness; and, ever and anon, hunger drove some mother to insane slaughter of the anæmic babe at her breast. The rich in high places rose up against a Savonarola and a Sir Thomas More and tried to silence the reproach of their goodness in death:

“And in such indexes, although small pricks
To their subsequent volumes, there is seen
The baby figure of the giant mass
Of things to come at large.”

Within reach of every banquet’s savor crouched the gaunt figure of Poverty; and the shadows of the Universities swept athwart the bleak paths of Ignorance and intensified the darkness. Gradually, through all the travail of the earth’s growth, came the machine to lift the burden from the straining muscles of men; and its only effect was to change the servitude of the many into an equally galling wage-slavery without surcease of misery and hate and crime. Meanwhile, the inherent goodness of human nature asserted itself in large heroism and patient bravery. Republics were builded out of the strength of the common people; and fine philosophies of liberty were engrossed upon the parchment of history, but humanity failed to reach the heights where gladness holds her breathing-places. The goodness of human nature seemed to be spent in the Sisyphus-like task of rolling some needless burden up the hill of Time and falling ever backward to the bottom in a futile renewal of toil.

As I read the annals of civilization in books and traced their later chapters in field and shop and factory, my early conviction of the inherent goodness of human nature was sharpened by its contrast with the physical evils everywhere so blatant. I saw the tragic waste of life wherewith the commerce of to-day stands crimsoned in the blood of the proletariat. I noticed little children slowly murdering by the loom and sewing-machine. In the disease-sodden tenements of the slums I saw hundreds of men and women dragging out a living death their lives foreshortening by the vilest adulteration of food and drink and by the foul air and reeking bodies of their fellow-men in the low, narrow rooms in which they huddled together. Drunkenness, insanity, and sexual perversions were all too common: nevertheless self-sacrifice, kindness, and wondrous patience were equally in evidence.

Continue reading “Hellraisers Journal: From The Comrade: “How I Became a Socialist” by Father Thomas Hagerty, Seventh in Series” →

Hellraisers Journal: Mother Jones Speaks at Public Meeting in Charleston, W. V., Children of Striking Miners Parade

23rd September 202225th September 2022 Janet RayeHellraisers Journal

Quote Mother Jones, Revolution Is Here, Speech Cton WV, Sept 21, 1912, Steel Speeches p116 —————

Hellraisers Journal – Monday September 23, 1912
Charleston, West Virginia – Mother Jones Speaks at Public Meeting

From the Baltimore Sun of September 22, 1912:

LABOR CONFERENCE VAIN
———-
Refusal To Take Up Kanawha Coal Troubles
Keeps Union Men Away.
———-

Charleston, W. Va., Sept 21.-The representatives of the commercial and civic bodies of West Virginia called by Governor Glasscock to consider the labor situation adjourned this afternoon after an exciting session without having accomplished anything.

International President John P. White, of the United Mine Workers of America, with Vice-President Hayes, announced early in the day that they would have nothing to do with the conference because they had learned that it was not the purpose of those in charge of the meeting to permit a discussion of the strike situation in the Kanawha coal field, where 1,200 West Virginia militiamen are maintaining martial law……

Hayes Addresses Strikers.

Vice-President Hayes addressed a large audience of striking miners and their sympathizers, and Mother Jones talked to another audience almost within the shadow of the State Capitol…..

Children Parade Streets.

One of the striking features of the day was the appearance on the streets of 100 children of striking miners, brought down from the mountains by “Mother” Jones.

They paraded the streets to the music of a band and bearing banners with these legends,

We are the babes that sleep in the woods.

We want to go to school and not to the mines.

The children, miners’ leaders say, were among those compelled to live much in the open since martial law was declared.

[Photograph and emphasis added.]

September 21, 1912, Charleston, West Virginia
-Mother Jones Speaks at Public Meeting Following Parade of Strikers’ Children:

I want to say to those children, they will be free; they will not be serfs. We have entered West Virginia-I have-and a hundred thousand miners have pledged their support to me, “If you need us, Mother, we will be there.” Five thousand men last Sunday night said, “We are ready, Mother, when you call on us.”

The revolution is here. We can tie up every wheel, every railroad in the State, when we want to do it. Tyranny, robbery and oppression of the people must go. The children must be educated. The childhood will rise to grander woman and grander man in happy homes and happy families-then we will need no saloons. We will need no saloons, nor any of your prohibition. As long as you rob us, of course we drink. The poison food you give us needs some other narcotic to knock the poison out of it. They charge you $2.40 for a bushel of potatoes at the “pluck-me” store. Ten pounds of slate in 9700 pounds of coal and you are docked-then they go and “give for Jesus.” “How charming Mr. Cabell is, he gives us $500.00.”

Let us, my friends, stand up like men. I have worked for the best interests of the working people for seventy-ﬁve years. I don’t need any one to protect me. I protect myself. I don’t break the law. Nobody molests me, except John Laing. John is the only dog in West Virginia that attacks a woman. He is the only fellow that would do that. I am not afraid of John Laing. I would give him a punch in the stomach and knock him over the railroad. I don’t know who punched him-he lost his pistol. I put my hand on him and told him to go home to his mother. I gave him a punch in the stomach, and he fell over the railroad track and lost his pistol. He didn’t know he lost it until he reached home.

He said, “You are disturbing my miners.” My slaves! Scabs! Dogs!

Boys, I want to say here, don’t go near the saloon today. You need the money to buy bread. When we win this ﬁght then we will make pure liquor. We will go to Washington-we will go to see Taft, because Wilson and the Bull Moose will be out of business. We will make Congress take over the liquor question, and make them make pure liquor. It will be like the postage stamps. We will need it for our stomachs. These fellows that are howling to make it “dry”-we will make it devilish wet-we are going to hand it all over to Uncle Sam. We won’t put the brewers out of business, we will make Uncle Sam put them all to work, and reduce the hours of labor to six. The operators said, “God Almighty, what are you talking about? Six hours!” Then we will go home to the children, and nurse and feed them. We will take the children out in the sunshine-(Cries of: “We will own the land”)-and bring happiness into our homes. And then you will not want to drink. We will have a violin and music in every home, and the children will dance. Shame! Forever shame! on the men and women in the State of West Virginia that stand for such a picture as we have here today-[Referring to the children of the coal camps who marched in the parade]-Shame! When the history is written, what will it be, my friends, when the history of this crime, starvation and murder of the innocents, so they can ﬁll the operators’ pockets, and build dog kennels for the workers. Is it right? Will it ever be right?

Continue reading “Hellraisers Journal: Mother Jones Speaks at Public Meeting in Charleston, W. V., Children of Striking Miners Parade” →

Hellraisers Journal: From the International Socialist Review: The Land Renters Union in Texas by T. A. Hickey, Part II

7th September 20227th September 2022 Janet RayeHellraisers Journal

Quote Robert Blatchford, Merrie England p149 150, Commonwealth 1895 —————

Hellraisers Journal – Saturday September 7, 1912
“The Land Renters Union in Texas” by T. A. Hickey, Part II

From the International Socialist Review of September 1912:

THE LAND RENTERS UNION IN TEXAS

BY T. A. HICKEY

[Part II of II]

Tenantry Inevitable.

In the face of the conditions just sketched it was inevitable that Texas, in spite of her enormous area of free land, should soon find tenantry developing. In 1870 five per cent of the men who tilled the soil in Texas were renters. In 1900 50 per cent were renters, while in 1910 71 per cent is operated by renters, while in the richest black land counties, such as Bell and Falls, 82 per cent of the land is operated by renters. In connection with this I may say that I have had some discussions with some of our socialist statisticians who claimed that the figures were somewhat less than I have given, but they overlooked the important fact, however, that the average renter needs from 80 to 160 acres, according to his family, to make a living, and that there are 29,118 farmers who own less than nineteen acres, a large proportion of whom are compelled to become renters so that they may live, and this is also true of the 98,363 farmers who own from twenty to forty-nine acres, hence my figures are conservative.

Increasing Rentals.

These renters of Texas, for two generations, have been accustomed to pay the landlord the traditional third and fourth, which means that of every three bushels of corn and grain that they produce, the landlord takes one; of every four bales of cotton the tenant produces, the landlord takes one. To the intense disgust of the renter, this third and fourth system is passing away. The landlords have commenced to demand a third all round, which means that the tenant must give up one bale out of every three instead of one out of every four.

Then the landlords commenced to demand of the tenant $1 an acre bonus, and some landlords have demanded as high as $2 and $3 an acre bonus as well as the third and fourth. The putting through of these reductions in the renter’s income produced a storm of discontent and was the main factor that led to the organization of the Renters’ Union, and inasmuch as the economic laws of capitalism will not permit of a reduction in these burdens now being piled upon the renters, it is inevitable that the Renters’ Union shall grow until it it the largest union in the United States.

I will now sketch the reasons why the landlords will not and cannot reduce these burdens.

Within the past fifteen years there has been a steady flow of capital to Texas. It was mostly brought to the state by wealthy farmers of Iowa, Nebraska, Missouri, Ohio and Illinois, who had sold out their lands at an enormous increase over what their fathers had secured them for. They believed they could come to Texas, buy lands at a “reasonable” price and trust to the growth of the state to enable them to secure large piles of unearned increment. They found, however, that the gentleman already on the ground was able to maintain the price of land at a very high figure, largely because of the fact that the public domain had disappeared and all hands were inclined to hold the land which, unlike other things, is a fixed quantity.

Thus it happens that land that in the 70’s sold for $2 per acre jumped to $40, $50, $100 and even higher. I was on one section of black land in Bell county near the town of Rogers last year that had just been sold to a Northern man for $150 an acre. The renters who worked this land when it was selling at $50 an acre paid a third and fourth and the landlord was satisfied with receiving a good return upon his investment, but when this land went to $150 an acre the new purchaser found that after meeting the fixed charges he could not secure 2 per cent on his investment, hence he was compelled, in order to receive what he considered an adequate return, to demand, as well as the third and fourth, $3 an acre bonus.

On the poorer lands, where production is not half what it is in the rich black land, a corresponding condition obtains, but the land being cheaper in price causes the landlord to ask a smaller bonus than in the black land belt. In either case the renter finds himself in the same position as the city wage earner. That is, he just receives enough to keep body and soul together and enable him to prepare for the next day’s toil.

Land Speculators in Clover.

The second reason for the inevitable growth of the Renters’ Union is found in the fact that, owing to the antiquated constitution under which the State of Texas is being ruled and that was drafted originally in the interests of the landlords, it is impossible to place an adequate tax upon idle land that is held out of cultivation for speculative purposes. The constitution provides that land shall not be taxed more than 35 cents on the $100, and the actual tax is considerably less than half of that sum.

Hence the million-acre land owners pay this petty tax on the millions of acres of land that they have fenced in and lie back in silent satisfaction as they watch the population growing by the natural growth within the state and the immense immigration from without. To give my readers an idea of the blighting effect upon the renter that results from this policy I will quote from an article published in the Chicago Tribune some months ago that was written by the present governor of Texas, 0. B. Colquitt. He said:

“There are 146,000,000 acres of land in Texas that has never felt the caressing touch of the plow; 46,000,000 acres of this land is of a mountainous and arid character, but there is 100,000,000 acres of fine arable land that has never been tilled.” The governor goes on to say. “All the public domain has gone. All of this land is now fenced in, in private hands.“

Continue reading “Hellraisers Journal: From the International Socialist Review: The Land Renters Union in Texas by T. A. Hickey, Part II” →

Hellraisers Journal: The Coming Nation: Children of New York City: Moment’s Relief, Photograph by Paul Thompson

25th August 202225th August 2022 Janet RayeHellraisers Journal

Quote EVD Childhood ed, Socialist Woman p12, Sept 1908 —————

Hellraisers Journal – Sunday August 25, 1912
New York, New York – “A Moments Relief” by Paul Thompson

From The Coming Nation of August 24, 1912:

From Bitter Cry of the Children by John Spargo, First Published 1906:

With the exception of the infant in arms these are all working children.
They were called away from the photographer to go on with their work!

Continue reading “Hellraisers Journal: The Coming Nation: Children of New York City: Moment’s Relief, Photograph by Paul Thompson” →

Hellraisers Journal: Mother Jones Speaks from Steps of Capitol at Charleston, W. V., Demands Removal of Mine Guards

22nd August 202222nd August 2022 Janet RayeHellraisers Journal

Quote Mother Jones, I Will Be With You, Cton WV, Aug 15, 1912, Speeches, Steel, p104 —————

Hellraisers Journal – Thursday August 22, 1912
Charleston, West Virginia – Mother Jones Demands Removal of Mine Guards

From The Wheeling Intelligencer of August 16, 1912:

HdLn Miners v Gunthugs, MJ Speaks Aug 15, Wlg Int p1, Aug 16, 1912

August 15, 1912, Charleston, West Virginia
-Mother Jones Speaks to Striking Miners from Steps of Capitol

NsClp Mother Jones Speaks Aug 15 Charleston WV, Wlg Int p1, Aug 16, 1912 — **Wheeling Intelligencer**
**August 16, 1912**

This, my friends, marks, in my estimation, the most remarkable move ever made in the State of West Virginia. It is a day that will mark history in the long ages to come. What is it? It is an uprising of the oppressed against the master class.

From this day on, my friends, Virginia–West Virginia–shall march in the front of the nation’s states. To me, I think, the proper thing to do is to read the purpose of our meeting here today–why these men have laid down their tools, why these men have come to the State House.

To His Excellency, William E. Glasscock,
Governor of the State of West Virginia:

It is respectfully represented unto your Excellency that the owners of the various coal mines doing business along the valley of Cabin Creek, Kanawha County, West Virginia, are maintaining and have at present in their employ a large force of armed guards, armed with Winchesters, a dangerous and deadly weapon; also having in their possession three Gatling guns, which they have stationed at commanding positions overlooking the Cabin Creek Valley, which said weapons said guards use for the purpose of brow-beating, intimidating and menacing the lives of all the citizens who live in said valley, and whose business calls them into said valley, who are not in accord with the management of the coal companies, which guards are cruel and their conduct toward the citizens is such that it would be impossible to give a detailed account of.

Therefore, suffice it to say, however, that they beat, abuse, maim and hold up citizens without process of law, deny freedom of speech, a provision guaranteed by the Constitution, deny the citizens to assemble in a peaceable manner for the purpose of discussing questions in which they are concerned. Said guards also hold up a vast body of laboring men who live at the mines, and so conduct themselves that a great number of men, women and children live in a state of constant fear, unrest and dread.

We hold that the stationing of said guards along the public highways, and public places is a menace to the general welfare of the state. That such action on the part of the companies in maintaining such guards is detrimental to the best interests of society and an outrage against the honor and dignity of the State of West Virginia. (Loud applause.)

As citizens interested in the public weal and general welfare, and believing that law and order, and peace, should ever abide, that the spirit of brotherly love and justice and freedom should everywhere exist, we must tender our petition that you would bring to bear all the powers of your office as Chief Executive of this State, for the purpose of disarming said guards and restoring to the citizens of said valley all the rights guaranteed by the Constitution of the United States and said State.

In duty bound, in behalf of the miners
of the State of West Virginia.

I want to say with all due respect to the Governor–I want to say to you that the Governor will not, cannot do anything, for this reason: The Governor was placed in this building by Scott and Elkins and he don’t dare oppose them. (Loud applause.) Therefore, you are asking the Governor of the State to do something that he cannot do without betraying the class he belongs to. (Loud applause.)

I remember the Governor in a state [Altgeld of Illinois], when Grover Cleveland was perched in the White House–Grover Cleveland said he would send the Federal troops out, and the Governor of that state said, “Will you? If you do I will meet your Federal troops with the state troops, and we will have it out.” Old Grover never sent the troops–he took back water. (Applause, and cries of: “Yes, he did.”)

You see, my friends, how quickly the Governor sent his militia when the coal operators got scared to death. (Applause.)

I have no objection to the militia. I would always prefer the militia, but there was no need in this county for the militia, none whatsoever. They were law-abiding people, and the women and children. They were held up on the highways, caught in their homes and pulled out like rats and beaten up–some of them. I said, “If there is no one else in the State of West Virginia to protest, I will protest.” (Loud applause, and cries of: “Yes, she will; Mother will.”)

The womanhood of this State shall not be oppressed and beaten and abused by a lot of contemptible, damnable blood-hounds, hired by the operators. They wouldn’t keep their dogs where they keep you fellows. You know that. They have a good place for their dogs and a slave to take care of them. The mine owners’ wives will take the dogs up, and say, “I love you, dea-h” (trying to imitate by tone of voice).

Now, my friends, the day for petting dogs is done; the day for raising children to a nobler manhood and better womanhood is here. (Applause and cries of: “Amen! Amen!”)

You have suffered, I know how you have suffered. I was with you nearly three years in this state. I went to jail, went to the Federal courts, but I never took any back water. I still unfurl the red flag of industrial freedom, no tyrant’s face shall you know, and I call you today into that freedom, long perched on the bosom (Interrupted by applause).

I am back again to find you, my friends, in a state of industrial peonage–after ten years absence I find you in a state of industrial peonage.

The Superintendent at Acme–I went up there, and they said we were unlawful–we had an unlawful mob along. Well, I will tell you the truth, we took a couple of guns, because we knew we were going to meet some thugs, and by jimminy (interrupted by applause).

We will prepare for the job, just like Lincoln and Washington did. We took lessons from them, and we are here to prepare for the job.

Well, when I came out on the public road the Superintendent–you know the poor salary slave–he came out and told me that there were Notary Publics there and a squire–one had a peg leg, and the balance had pegs in their skulls. (Applause.)

They forbid me speaking on the highway, and said that if I didn’t discontinue I would be arrested. Well, I want to tell you one thing, I don’t run to jail, but when the blood-hounds undertake to put me in jail I will go there. I have gone there. I would have had the little peg-leg Squire arrest me only I knew this meeting was going to be pulled off today to let the world know what was going on in West Virginia. When I get through with them, by the Eternal God they will be glad to let me alone.

I am not afraid of jails. We build the jails, and when we get ready we will put them behind the bars. That may happen very soon–things happen overnight.

Continue reading “Hellraisers Journal: Mother Jones Speaks from Steps of Capitol at Charleston, W. V., Demands Removal of Mine Guards” →

Hellraisers Journal: Whereabouts and Doings of Mother Jones for July 1902, Part III: Found in Cincinnati on Her Way Back to West Virginia to Face Possible Jail Term

18th August 202218th August 2022 Janet RayeHellraisers Journal

Quote Mother Jones, Going to Jail, Cnc Pst p6, July 23, 1902 —————

Hellraisers Journal – Monday August 18, 1902
Mother Jones News Round-Up for July 1902, Part III
Found Speaking at Central Labor Council Meeting in Cincinnati

From The North Adams Transcript of July 21, 1902:

PATHETIC FAREWELL FOR “MOTHER” JONES
———-
On Leaving Indianapolis to Go
to Jail for Contempt

Indianapolis, Ind., July 21-An affecting scene was witnessed in the United Mine Workers’ headquarters last evening when “Mother” Jones bade the miners goodby and boarding a train for West Virginia.

“Mother” Jones was on trial early last week with several striking miners for contempt of court in holding public meetings in the face of an injunction, and she was found guilty. She now returns to receive sentence, and it is believed she will be sent to jail.

Many of the delegates to the recent convention are still here, and in the crowd gathered in the headquarters not a single dry eye was to be seen when “Mother” said goodby. Men whose faces were as hard as parchment with the work in the mines and with the hardship of their lives wiped the tears away with their rough hands and some of them left the room.

“Mother” Jones cheered them up and made little of the coming ordeal, but the miners knew she was doing it for them, and if she were their own mother they could not have a warmer love in their hearts for her.

[Photograph added.]

From the Baltimore Sun of July 22, 1902:

Charleston, W. Va., July 21.-Upon the application of the Collins Colliery, Federal Judge Keller today issued attachments for the arrest of John Richards, president of District No. 17, United Mine Workers of America, and 35 other members who took part in meetings near that mine. Special complaint was made against a meeting of July 17 as an alleged violation of the injunction issued against National Secretary Wilson, “Mother” Jones and others. After their arrest today Richards and 10 others were taken before the United States Commissioner at Hinton, where they gave bonds, and the hearing was set for next Friday in Charleston.

Judge Guthrie, of the State Court, issued an attachment for the arrest of 10 miners on complaint of the Kanawha and Hocking Coal Company, which held that they had violated an injunction of his court.

Continue reading “Hellraisers Journal: Whereabouts and Doings of Mother Jones for July 1902, Part III: Found in Cincinnati on Her Way Back to West Virginia to Face Possible Jail Term” →

Hellraisers Journal: Birds Care for Their Young While Capitalists Feed Off Nation’s Young -Cartoon by Ryan Walker

14th July 202214th July 2022 Janet RayeHellraisers Journal

Quote Mother Jones Children Suffer PA Silk Mills, Cdale Ldr p6, Nov 30, 1900 —————

Hellraisers Journal – Sunday July 14, 1912
American Children Born to Feed the Monster Capitalistism

From The Coming Nation of July 13, 1912
-Cartoon by Ryan Walker: Birds Care for Young; Capitalists Feed off the Young:

Continue reading “Hellraisers Journal: Birds Care for Their Young While Capitalists Feed Off Nation’s Young -Cartoon by Ryan Walker” →

Hellraisers Journal: From The Comrade: “Child Labor in Free America” by John Spargo, Illustrated by Ryan Walker

3rd July 20224th July 2022 Janet RayeHellraisers Journal

Mother Jones Quote, Child Labor Man of Six Snuff Sniffer —————

Hellraisers Journal – Thursday July 3, 1902
“Child Labor in Free America” by John Spargo, Illustrated by Ryan Walker

From The Comrade of July 1902:

———-

Mocking the stately phrases of the Declaration of Independence and the proud boast enshrined in our national songs, is the terrible reality of child-slavery. From the far South comes a cry from children that know no childhood and upon whose degradation the great edifice of our commercial supremacy is being raised. Not since the early years of the last century when the great and good Robert Owen, Michael Sadler and the seventh Earl of Shaftsbury (then Lord Ashley) gave voice to the terrible condition of the mere babes who languished and toiled in British mills and factories, has such a terrible story of shame been told as that which is told of Alabama, Georgia, and the two Carolinas to-day. Little boys and girls of five, six, seven, and eight years, toiling in factories ten, and even twelve, hours a day, all unconsciously mock our “civilization” and imperil the very life of the nation.

But it is not alone in these States that child labor prevails. From almost every State in the Union the cry of the child toiler for rest, for childhood, for life, is heard. In the North no less than the South; East no less than the West, the same great problem exists-the problem of child labor co-existing side by side with a permanent army of unemployed adults. In the textile mills of the South it is estimated that there are at least 20,000 children at work under fourteen years of age. In Alabama alone there are some twelve hundred children employed, being a proportion of between six and seven per cent of all the operatives. In Georgia the proportion of children under twelve to grown persons employed in the mills is stated to be not less than 14 per cent, and in South Carolina it is at least nine per cent. The ages of these children thus classified as “under twelve” run all the way down to six and even five years!

Let those who prate of our “glorious progress,” and boast of our ascendant commercial power, reflect upon the terrible fact that little children, scarcely more than babies, can be found by the thousand in these southern mills working 12 and 12½ hours every day at the spinning frames for wages that range from ten to twenty cents a day. Here is a terrible account of this child slavery, written by a special correspondent of Cincinnati Post, which should be sufficient of itself to shame the people of this country, and to rouse them to vigorous action. He says:

I secured entrance to the People’s mills of Montgomery, (Alabama) which manufacture sheeting for the China trade. In the spinning room, where most of the children are employed, there were 125 persons of all ages at work. Of that number between 40 and 50 were children less than 12 years old. Those who had ever been in a school house were rare exceptions. In this room I saw boys and girls so small that their efforts to perform their work were absolutely pitiful. In reaching up to join the ends of the broken threads they were obliged to strain and stretch every muscle and sinew of their frail bodies and some were so small that they were compelled to stand on their tiptoes. This was repeated every five minutes or oftener for twelve long hours. I called the foreman’s attention to several little ones who I was sure could not be over six years old and was told “they are not working,” which meant that they were not on the pay-roll, but were helping the parent or older brother or sister, or learning the machines, so as to be able to take their place in that mill.

Continue reading “Hellraisers Journal: From The Comrade: “Child Labor in Free America” by John Spargo, Illustrated by Ryan Walker” →

Hellraisers Journal: “Knight of the Round Belly” by Robert Minor: U. S. Supreme Court Rules Against Nation’s Child Workers

1st July 20223rd July 2022 Janet RayeHellraisers Journal

Mother Jones Quote ed, Suffer Little Children, CIR p10641, May 14, 1915

Hellraisers Journal – Saturday July 1, 1922
“The Knight of the Round Belly” by Robert Minor
-United State Supreme Court Rules Against Nation’s Child Workers

From The Liberator of July 1922:

January 1911, South Pittston Pennsylvania
-Breaker Boys of Pennsylvania Coal Company by Lewis Hine

The dust was so dense at times as to obscure the view. This dust penetrates the utmost recesses of the boy’s lungs. A kind of slave driver sometimes stands over the boys, prodding or kicking them into obedience.

Continue reading “Hellraisers Journal: “Knight of the Round Belly” by Robert Minor: U. S. Supreme Court Rules Against Nation’s Child Workers” →

Hellraisers Journal: “Children to the Lions” by Irwin St. John Tucker, U. S. Supreme Court Rules Against Nations’ Little Workers

26th June 202226th June 2022 Janet RayeHellraisers Journal

Mother Jones Quote ed, Suffer Little Children, CIR p10641, May 14, 1915 —————

Hellraisers Journal – Monday June 26, 1922
United States Supreme Court Rules Against Nation’s Children

From Debs Magazine of June 1922:

Continue reading “Hellraisers Journal: “Children to the Lions” by Irwin St. John Tucker, U. S. Supreme Court Rules Against Nations’ Little Workers” →

Tag: Child Labor